


Wise Man's Hell

by t_pock



Category: Being Human (UK), The Almighty Johnsons
Genre: Anders escapes being breakfast by a narrow margin, M/M, Mitchell drives a hotel shuttle, One Night Stand
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-25
Updated: 2014-04-25
Packaged: 2018-01-20 19:15:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1522463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/t_pock/pseuds/t_pock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders visits Costa Rica. Paradise isn't the right word.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wise Man's Hell

**Author's Note:**

> It's the end of the semester and I am 3000% done. Proceed with forgiveness because this is my first time writing these boys.

Anders can’t decide if he’s more impressed or unnerved by the volcano dominating the view from his hotel window.

It’s tall and imposing, a blackened cone with a dense skirt of tropical forest girding its slopes. Anders is no stranger to fire mountains—Auckland’s peppered with about 48 of them. They’re aborted little mounds, however, and extinct. He’s never seen one like this: a proper peak, like a punch of earth to the sky.

There’s also the fact that it’s spewing tiny ribbons of lava.

He’d raised a bit of hell about it when he’d checked in. The receptionist had pacified him with a speech about how the volcano rarely did more than hiccup, and when it did it only ever puked down the side facing the lake, never toward the city proper or the various hotels on its flank. That’s what they tell all the tourists, Anders thinks sourly, hardly reassured when the dusk makes the flecks of molten rock popping from the crater look like sparks.

He turns away from the window and toward the vanity stand. The mirror isn’t kind—he still looks wan and faded, despite having made a beeline for his bed the moment the hotel shuttle dropped him off. He’d been little more than a beast when he finally stepped off of the plane in San Jose after 33 hours of travel, and he’s barely civilized now. He makes a face at his reflection and sips on some coffee from the brewer next to his mini fridge, trying to perk up.

He’s forgone a suit—it’s too fucking hot. He’s been in Costa Rica for a day and he’s already taken three showers, the faucet turned to cold for the first time since he was a teenager. The humidity is insistent, however; the moment he steps outside the muggy air crowds him all over again. The only reason he’s not toting one of those electric hand fans is because it clashes with his professional image, and if there’s one thing he’d like to project tonight, it’s cool professionalism.

J:PR is no longer _boutique_ —the company has gone international and he has a clientele base clamoring for his public relations expertise on which the sun never sets. Ever since he got his big break with that Sydney-based jewelry company he’s been reeling in the big fish, and he’s learned the value of carrying himself like he does.

The value being rewards like this, where his client pays for them to meet in luxury.

This entire getaway is the treat of one Gie Araya, CEO of a multi-million Central American travel guide agency—a little piece of tropical heaven to butter him up. Anders has done some truly genius promotional work for her company and is in her good graces, but he’s almost certain that she’ll want to negotiate a policy change tonight, that she’ll ply him with alcohol and good food until he agrees to draft a new ad campaign for 60% of what he asked last time. For the air-conditioned hotel room, he briefly thinks about letting her (but of course he’ll hold out for 75%).

The alarm on his phone alerts him to the time—he has a dinner date with her and the senior members of her management board in ten minutes. He decides on a tie at the last second to show he isn’t a bitch about the heat, and then he shoves his phone and room key in his pocket and steps outside. He’s barely past his doorstep before he starts sweating again, even though the day has already retreated behind the volcano’s western foothills. He resigns himself to broiling alive and heads out to stand at the mouth of the cul-de-sac of hotel cabins.

The wait isn’t long—the shuttle comes trundling down the road that winds around the sprawling grounds of the hotel within minutes, a sleek white van emblazoned with the hotel emblem. It brakes to a halt in front of Anders, and as he steps off the curb and approaches the side the rear automatic door slides open. He climbs inside, notes with relief the AC blasting from the front, and takes a seat near the driver as the door closes behind him.

He contemplates offering up a thank you, but Dawn had laughed entirely too hard when he’d demonstrated his fledgling Spanish to her the day before he left. Bragi is good for poetry but shit for accents, apparently. The shuttle jerks back into motion before he can speak so he merely slouches in his seat and gets comfortable for the short ride.

His eyes flit to the driver as he pulls out his phone to check his email; all he glimpses from behind the bulwark of the front seat are gloved hands on the steering wheel.  He notices that the rearview mirror has been removed and is in the middle of wondering how advisable that is when the shuttle hops a speed hump and his phone slips from his grip and falls between his feet.

“Fuck,” he mumbles, bending to retrieve it. He’s surprised by a laugh from up front.

“Sorry, mate,” comes the unexpected English, in a very unexpected brogue. “Should’ve warned you.” The driver leans into Anders’ sight for a heartbeat and offers up a sheepish grimace. He’s way too pale for the Costa Rican sun, especially with a head of messy black curls washing him out, but that’s all Anders can take in—in the next second he’s out of sight and reduced to gloved hands once more.

“Yes, you should have,” Anders says easily, still groping for his phone. Beyond a brief interaction with the hotel staff, he hasn’t been addressed in his mother tongue since he left the airport; it’s a relief to speak without having to resort to hand gestures. “Have a care for the exhausted.”

“Ah, a jet-lagged one,” the driver says knowingly. “Vacation only just started?”

“I wish,” Anders grunts, fingers finally brushing the corner of his mobile. “Here on business.”

“Working in paradise,” the driver tsks. “Tragic.”

“You’d know all about that,” Anders points out, indicating the shuttle. He remembers at the last second that the driver can’t see him but he gets a laugh anyway.

“There’s harder work than this,” he says glibly. “And worse places.”

“Too true,” Anders says, and is promptly distracted by a forward from Dawn. His focus is divided between the email and the conversation, but he’s curious so he adds absently, “You seem fiercely Irish—how came you to paradise?”

Without missing a beat, the driver says, “I fall where the wind blows.”

And Anders’ attention snaps back to him, because something swells up like an angry sea in the back of his mind, boiling over the way it does any time someone feeds him deceit. The sense of holy indignation is potent, and Anders spends a moment marveling at the ferocity of it before he extricates himself from the surge of righteous anger. Bragi may not be able to suffer a lie, but Anders couldn’t care less that people tell falsehoods as easily as breathing.

“Must have been a strong wind,” he shrugs. And that’s that.

The shuttle rolls to another stop and a couple climbs in too—from Kenya, if the flag patches sewn onto their matching traveling packs is anything to go by. Anders stares the lady, all long linear limbs and dark skin with her bikini showing through her flimsy tank top, but she doesn’t even look at him. He goes back to reading his email.

The remainder of the ride passes in relative silence, broken only by periodic snatches of quiet Swahili from the back. No one else gets on. The dining pavilion gets closer and closer, a long structure attached to the big main building housing the honeycomb of the hotel’s front desk, offices, and exercise and technological facilities. The pavilion has no walls and stands open to the night—lantern light spills out onto the curb that the shuttle stops next to.

The door opens. Anders pulls himself out of the van and back into wet heat, frowning at the way his shirt starts sticking to his skin. He pats his pockets to make sure he hasn’t left anything, and then on a whim, because he’s annoyed by the way part of him is still simmering, ducks his head back in before the door shuts.

The driver turns to look. Now that Anders isn’t sitting behind him, he can see that he’s got a severe face made more menacing by the shadows cast by the glow from the car console—a thunderous brow, a sharp nose, a stern mouth, a strong jaw covered in barely kempt scruff. Anders gives him a winning smile.

“Thanks for the lift,” he says, sugary sweet, because it makes Bragi retreat.

He finds himself severely underprepared for the smile he gets in return—the frown dissipates like storm clouds clearing, and the corners of that scowl pull up into a sun of a grin that looks so helplessly pleased Anders feels his own smile distill into something genuine. “It’s my job,” the driver says, winking.

Anders clears his throat. “Work in paradise,” he points out, and leans back to let the door close.

-

He is definitely impressed by dinner.

The black silhouette of the volcano looms over the meal. He can barely finish his plate—piled high with rice served with black beans, avocado wedges soaked in lime, carne asada still steaming on the ceramic, and fried plantains charred and sweet. He washes it down with a tall glass of horchata and through sheer will power and greed alone manages to stuff a serving of tres leches down his gullet.

Araya sits directly across from him so she can look him in the eye as they make small talk over the food. Anders mentally concedes a point to her—she’s barely perspiring in her three-piece suit. She’s a heavy woman with hair that falls in thick waves down to her soft waist, but she looks entirely composed in the swampy heat. Her grin is shark-like when she notices his damp collar.

She’s as no-nonsense as they come, but fortunately for him she responds to Bragi like lyre string to a minstrel—when he plucks, she croons.

The real formalities were conducted via technology earlier in the week—Dawn’s new underling is the senior correspondent for Araya’s company, the one who came early into the office for several cross-continental conference calls, but Anders doesn’t like letting anyone outside of Dawn or himself talk price so he came to close the discussion himself. Dinner is mostly casual conversation, with a few verbal darts thrown in to keep him on his toes.

It goes better than he’d hoped—they settle at 80%.

Dessert is only just being cleared from the table when Araya leans forward and says, “Enough talk. Now we celebrate.” She exchanges a few words with the waiter that appears at her summons and then they’re being served a beer of strong local brew and Anders’ night gets a little bit better.

He gets tipsier than he intends. Araya tries to haggle some more over their drinks, as he expected, but he keeps his head enough to remember to dig his heels in. As the glasses pile up her composure wanes, fleeing before the flush that creeps up from the neck of her vest. He figures it’s time to go when he starts getting distracted by thoughts of popping all the buttons on her suit—he could win her in a heartbeat, but he’s willing to bet last year’s profits that the first thing she’d do the next morning is cancel her contract with J:PR and take a shit all over his company ratings. He calls it a night when one of her board members starts up a rousing chorus of a song he can probably guess the meaning of—his hosts all give him sloppy handshakes and then Araya waves him away with the promise of brunch tomorrow.

There’s no brisk night air to sober him up as he waits for the shuttle on the curb again. He stews in the humidity and tries to ignore the lingering throb in his groin as he waits. Eventually the shuttle pulls up and the door opens and he climbs into blessed cool air.

He takes a seat close to the front again and lets out a snort when he sees a familiar tumble of black curls. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” he drawls, and if it comes out a little less humorous and a little coyer than he meant, it’s too late to take it back.

The driver leans out and that gut-wrenching smile from before resurfaces. “This affair is out of hand,” he agrees, and the van lurches into motion.

“My family doesn’t approve,” Anders jokes, throwing his arms and legs out to catch the most of the AC blowing out of the vents. “They say you’re bad news.” A brief tug loosens his tie and he wrestles with the collar of his button-down until he can open it down to his collarbone.

He’s just tipsy enough to miss the strange pause before the driver gives a stunted chuckle. “Oh, I am.”

Anders hums. Now that it’s not hot enough for his arousal to feel like a hot coal in the pit of his stomach, the horniness from dinner rekindles. It makes him purr when he says, “Dangerous too.”

“Very,” the driver says, not quite flippantly.

There’s a voice in Anders’ head telling him to mind what little brain-to-mouth filter he has—it sounds suspiciously like Mike. Anders has never been the obedient brother. “Don’t worry,” he announces, the gush of beer loud in his pulse. “I like danger.”

Buzzed or not, there’s no mistaking the pause this time. “Do you?” the driver asks finally, and Anders is startled by the sudden lowness of his voice.

It sends a frisson of something down his spine—either nerves or excitement, though alcohol turns them into pretty much the same thing. “My middle name, and so on,” he says, trousers a little snug.

There’s a beat of silence. Eventually the driver coughs, and when he speaks again his voice is deliberately light. “Can’t go against your family though, can we?”

Doesn’t that bring back teenaged memories of the first and last time Anders got caught with his hand down another guy’s pants. He sneers. “I’m already the black sheep.” It’s been years since he’s thrown a line at someone other than a woman, and yet he finds himself smirking, “One more transgression can’t hurt.”

It startles a laugh out of the driver. “Not one for repentance, are you?”

“Can’t say that I am,” Anders admits without shame. He’s got half a boner and a fourth of his wits, which is why he doesn’t stop himself from adding, “There are other shuttles. I can’t imagine you’d be missed, if you’re up for a little transgressing.”

The van hisses to a stop—they’re in front of Anders’ place. The door opens but Anders doesn’t make any move to get out, just tips his head back and lets the cool air blow across his throat. The driver turns around.

“I thought you were here on business,” he says, but it’s not a no and Anders doesn’t need Bragi to tell him that the nonchalance in it is brittle. He feels more than a little satisfaction at the way the driver’s eyes drop to the skin visible through the folds of his open shirt.

“I was,” he smirks. “And now I’m here for pleasure.”

“Good for you,” the driver says, betraying himself with a nearly audible swallow and a compulsive lick to his lips. “I’ve still got work.”

Anders knows what a weak will sounds like. “Less work, more paradise,” he says sagely. He thinks about using Bragi to tip the scales, but by the time he summons the honey to his tongue the engine is being turned off and the keys yanked out of the ignition.

-

Anders forgets about the fucking volcano.

Gooseflesh pebbles across his skin as he keys open his door and stumbles into the refrigerated air. He slaps the switch on the room’s lamp and in the soft yellow light toes out of his shoes and slips out of the slack noose of his tie. He raises his head to smirk at his company for the night and realizes that the driver is still standing at the threshold.

He takes up most of the doorway. His chin is tucked to his chest and he’s looking up at Anders through the curls that have fallen forward to dangle in his face, eyes terribly dark. Without glancing away he pulls off his gloves with his teeth and tosses them across Anders’ floor.

Anders’ throat tightens. He’s never seen someone look so hungry.

A shiver skitters down his spine but he summons up enough bravado to hold his arms out and say, “Come and get me.”

Then the driver is elbowing the door shut and stalking across the room to push him up beside the vanity stand, body solid as rock and about as immovable. Crowded between the wall and hard muscle, Anders immediately notices the height difference—the driver’s half-hard cock is pressed up tight against his stomach. He feels his breath trip.

“Got a name?” the driver asks, bracing himself on the wall next to Anders’ face. At this proximity his scent is overwhelming—pungent and a little stale and heady enough to make Anders’ dick twitch in his slacks.

“What?” he contributes, head swimming. He fists his fingers in the fabric of the driver’s shirt and uses his grip to pull them even closer, getting on tip-toes to rock their hips together. Pleasure sears his belly and he stiffens a little more. “Oh. Anders.”

“Call me Mitchell,” the driver returns, hands dropping to snap around Anders’ wrists like manacles and pin them above his head.

“Will do,” Anders rasps. The words are barely out of his mouth before a cool mouth is on top of his.

Mitchell kisses like a starving man. Anders squirms under the assault, just for show, but he’s well and truly caught—arms shoved up and head too dizzy for lack of air to get anywhere. Mitchell coaxes their lips together until Anders opens to him and lets him lick inside, instinctively sucking his tongue. At that Mitchell lets out a grunt and kicks Anders’ feet apart enough to slide his leg between them.

“How do you like it?” he asks, voice gritty. Anders starts riding his thigh with a moan.

He means to say, “On top,” but what comes out is an incriminating, “Surprise me.”

Then Mitchell’s hands release his wrists to drop down and grab him under the ass, lifting him up. Anders is briefly disoriented by the easy way Mitchell spins them around and takes a step forward—then his stomach drops as Mitchell throws him bodily to the bed. He bounces when he hits the mattress.

“ _Jesus_ ,” he groans as he watches Mitchell strip off his shirt and then yank down the zipper of his jeans. He scrambles to get his own shirt off but only gets halfway through the buttons before Mitchell is on him.

The weight of him spreads Anders’ legs and brings their cocks back into contact. Mitchell rolls his hips down, grinding until they’re both fully hard. The slide of them together is electric even through the insulating fabric of their trousers, and it makes Anders drop his head back against the sheets.

Mitchell immediately skates his mouth down the side of his neck, pressing wet kisses from the shelf of Anders’ jaw to the shallow well of his collarbones where his sweat has collected. “Got anything?” he asks, lips mirroring the treatment on the other side.

Anders would scoff but he’s busy appreciating the rhythm Mitchell is working up between them. “Nightstand,” he breathes, because condoms and lube are always the first things he unpacks and there are a few packets strewn on the bedside table where he tossed them earlier.

Mitchell lifts up to retrieve them and Anders takes the opportunity to shed the remainder of his clothes, throwing his shirt over the side of the bed and pushing his trousers down his legs. When Mitchell returns he helps with Anders’ briefs and then shoves down his own jeans and underwear, leaving them both naked and panting. Mitchell gives him a hard kiss as he resettles above him, pumping his cock a few times with a slick hand before dropping down to his ass.

The first touch to his hole reminds Anders of why he never does this. He’s tight and tense and the force Mitchell has to use to sink one finger into him nearly makes it hurt, but he starts tugging at his cock to move things along at the same time Mitchell starts sucking marks across his shoulders and it isn’t long before he opens up. Eventually Anders is clenching around three fingers and red in the face and bucking impatiently upward.

“Fuck me already,” he demands. Mitchell obliges—he grabs one of Anders’ thighs and hauls it up, hooking a hand behind his knee to keep him spread while he guides himself inside.

It burns the whole way in.

By the time Mitchell bottoms out, Anders’ breathing is shallow and he’s digging his short nails into Mitchell’s back. Mitchell is braced on an elbow above him, trembling all over at the slow push into Anders’ tight heat, muscles bunched and coiled like an animal before a pounce as he waits.

“Do it hard,” Anders gasps. Mitchell obeys.

The first thrust makes Anders’ back bow. Mitchell’s hipbones knife into him as he pushes inside, the slap of skin on skin loud between them. He pulls out agonizingly slow, letting them both feel the drag, before shoving back in with enough strength to make Anders suck in a breath. Another slow pull out—Anders’ nails scrape down Mitchell’s flank to the dip of his lower back to pull him forward again, and again, and again until Mitchell is thrusting into him at a pace that makes him grit his teeth.

Despite the fact that it hurts more than it feels good, it isn’t long until Anders’ dick is leaking all over his belly and the breathless laugh that always wells up in him during a good fuck turns his mouth up at the corners. Mitchell is too big for how long it’s been since Anders has done this but the stretch and the friction send thrills through him that make him hook his ankles above Mitchell’s ass to haul him down even harder.

Mitchell hasn’t stopped mouthing at the column of Anders’ throat, his own heavy breaths ghosting coolly across the damp tracks his sloppy kisses leave. He fucks relentlessly, slamming inside in a rhythm that doesn’t break even when he grazes Anders’ sweet spot and Anders jerks off the mattress. He fists a hand in Anders’ short hair and pulls his head back, exposing his throat so he can stick his nose in the crook of his neck. Anders grunts at the sting in his scalp and the glide of Mitchell’s cool mouth across his pulse, getting desperate for a firmer touch. He’s about to reach down to jack himself off when suddenly Mitchell pulls out.

He goes too fast and leaves a sharp ache, but Anders’ cock still jumps at the aborted pleasure. He groans out a disgruntled, “What the fuck?” and without thought uses his heels to try and pull him back inside.

Mitchell pulls Anders up by the shoulders and, in an impressive demonstration of strength, turns him bodily over. He pushes Anders’ legs back apart before thrusting back inside and resuming his punishing grind like he never stopped.

He drills Anders until Anders groans under the onslaught and falls to his elbows, unable to keep his hands from slipping on the sheets. The new angle is merciless—it makes him graze that spot that shoves a litany of _ah, ah, ah_ out of Anders until he can’t help but reach a hand down to help himself.

Mitchell doesn’t let him. He plants a palm between Anders’ shoulder blades and bears down until Anders’ chest hits the bed, dropping his other hand down to grab an asscheek and hold Anders open. The shudder that wrecks Anders’ spine at the show of force has him clenching so tight it gets Mitchell cursing and fucking him hard through the sudden squeeze.

Anders starts whimpering. He can feel Mitchell’s hips pumping forward with less and less restraint. He hunkers down, hands sliding under Anders to pull him back to his chest. His face is once again buried in Anders’ neck, lips on the veins popping up as his embrace turns crushing and Anders’ breath starts coming short. He thinks he can feel the dig of Mitchell’s teeth, suddenly razor sharp against his skin, before Mitchell suddenly tears his mouth away and lets him fall back to the mattress.

Anders’ balls are drawn up and his dick is hard enough to burst—he wants to shoot so bad he thinks he won’t need more than a few strokes to blow his load. He tries a second time to wedge a hand between him and the bed, desperate to get off, but he doesn’t get far before Mitchell grabs the back of his neck and holds him down, pinning him with his arms trapped under his chest. He shoves inside hard enough to shunt Anders up the bed, and that’s when Anders lets out a wail and comes.

Mitchell doesn’t stop fucking. The sensitivity left in the wake of Anders’ orgasm makes it really overwhelming really fast, shocks running through his limbs. When Anders tries to shy away, the brushes against his sweet spot too much too soon, Mitchell seizes him by the hips and drags him back up, pulling him onto his cock.

His last few thrusts make the headboard knock against the wall with a noise like a gunshot. Anders hisses, “Just come in me,” and reaches a hand back to dig his nails into Mitchell’s hip, and that’s when Mitchell comes, shoving in balls-deep and groaning through the worst of it.

He’s heavy when he lets his weight fall onto Anders’ back, but he only rests there for a second before he’s pulling out with a great deal more care than before and flopping onto the mattress next to Anders. Anders is still face down in the blanket, struggling to recover his breath.

“You’re an asshole,” is the first thing he says when he can speak, but even to his own ears his voice is dreamy and fucked out and not terribly compelling.

“Sorry,” Mitchell pants, tipping onto his side to rid himself of the condom and chucking it at the bin by the vanity stand. Anders chooses to believe he makes it in. “Alright?” he asks.

Anders still hasn’t moved—despite the fact that he’s lying in his own wet spot—because his arms are weak and his thighs are shaking and his hole feels puffy and hot and thoroughly used.  “Probably,” he shrugs.

“I’m sorry,” Mitchell repeats, and Anders is about to tell him not to apologize for a good fuck when he says, “I should get going.”

Anders summons enough energy to give him a thumbs-up. “Playtime’s over,” he agrees.

“That’s a different tune,” Mitchell snorts, but Anders can already hear the rustle of him throwing his clothes back on. He decides at the last minute to be helpful by throwing the glove that landed on the floor next to the bed back at Mitchell.

“I was paradise,” he mumbles. “Get back to work.”

Mitchell’s answer is indistinct. The door closes softly behind him.

-

The volcano is shrouded in cloud when Anders wakes up.

He’s got a bitch of a headache and his tongue feels furry. Everything from his lower back down to his knees aches like it’s been bulldozed. He excavates himself from the sheets with effort to get the coffee brewer in order and downs a few ibuprofens before crawling into the shower to wash off flakes of jizz.

He makes himself as presentable as he can, stepping gingerly into slacks and the thinnest shirt he owns, and leaves for brunch. The shuttle he takes down to the dining pavilion isn’t Mitchell’s, which is all for the best because Anders doesn’t really do mornings-after, even when the nights-before see him railed hard and screwed senseless. He got his end away, and as far as he’s concerned that’s all she wrote.

It’s just Araya at the table this time, looking entirely unflappable in another suit. She is once more aloof, even if he can practically see the twin headache pounding at her skull. He tries not to let his limp show, since sharks can smell blood half a kilometer away, but he thinks he sees her holding back laughter when he struggles to lower himself into his seat. Breakfast is gallo pinto: rice and beans with seared onions and bell peppers and scrambled egg in tortilla, smothered in salsa lizano.

It’s while they’re eating that Araya tells him about the young girl the hotel staff found this morning, sprawled in the tub of her room with blood loss from a savage neck wound. Anders isn’t sure why but the words summon the phantom sensation of Mitchell’s mouth at his throat—it makes him feel a bit off to think about that the two in conjunction, so he interrupts Araya to spitball some ideas on how to keep the girl’s death from downing her travel rates.

She leaves him at the table after they shake hands over a date for future consultation. Anders inhales the flowery scent of her perfume as she walks past and listens to the click of her heels on the pavilion’s floor until the sound fades—then he’s looking up at the hazy crest of the volcano alone.

He sips his mango fresco and thinks that maybe paradise is the wrong word.

**Author's Note:**

> I also exist at t-pock.tumblr.com.


End file.
